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the 1960s, and the floorboards are covered with Turkish carpets.
    Except you can’t actually see the carpets, because they’re mostly covered in old documents and manuscripts which no one ever bothers to clear up. No one’s big on tidying in the Tavish family. I once found a fossilized boiled egg in aspare-room bed, still in its eggcup, with a desiccated toast soldier. It must have been about a year old.
    And everywhere, all over the house, are books. Stacked up three deep on shelves, piled on the floor, and on the side of every lime-stained bath. Antony writes books, Wanda writes books, Magnus writes books, and his elder brother, Conrad, writes books. Even Conrad’s wife, Margot, writes books. 12
    Which is great. I mean, it’s a wonderful thing, all these genius intellectuals in one family. But it does make you feel just the teensiest, weensiest bit inadequate.
    Don’t get me wrong, I think I’m pretty intelligent. You know, for a normal person who went to school and college and got a job and everything. But these aren’t normal people; they’re in a different league. They have superbrains. They’re the academic version of The Incredibles . 13 I’ve met his parents only a few times, when they flew back to London for a week for Antony to give some big important lecture, but it was enough to show me. While Antony was lecturing about political theory, Wanda was presenting a paper on feminist Judaism to a think tank, and then they both appeared on The Culture Show , taking opposing views on a documentary about the influence of the Renaissance. 14 So that was the backdrop to our meeting. No pressure or anything.
    I’ve been introduced to quite a few different boyfriends’parents over the years, but hands down this was the worst experience, ever. We’d just shaken hands and made a bit of small talk and I was telling Wanda quite proudly where I’d been to college, when Antony looked up over his half-moon glasses, with those bright, cold eyes of his, and said, “A degree in physiotherapy. How amusing.” I felt instantly crushed. I didn’t know what to say. In fact, I was so flustered I left the room to go to the loo. 15
    After that, of course, I froze. Those three days were sheer misery. The more intellectual the conversation became, the more tongue-tied and awkward I was. My second-worst moment: pronouncing Proust wrong and everyone exchanging looks. 16 My very worst moment: watching University Challenge all together in the drawing room, when a section on bones came on. My subject! I studied this! I know all the Latin names and everything! But as I was drawing breath to answer the first question, Antony had already given the correct answer. I was quicker next time—but he still beat me. The whole thing was like a race, and he won. Then, at the end, he looked over at me and inquired, “Do they not teach anatomy at physiotherapy school, Poppy?” and I was mortified .
    Magnus says he loves me , not my brain, and that I’ve got to ignore his parents. And Natasha said, think of the rock and the Hampstead house and the villa in Tuscany. Which is Natasha for you. Whereas my own approach has been as follows: Just don’t think about them. It’s been fine. They’ve been safely in Chicago, thousands of miles away.
    But now they’re back.
    Oh God. And I’m still a bit shaky on Proust . (Proost? Prost?) And I didn’t revise the Latin names for bones. And I’m wearing red woolly reindeer gloves in April. With tassels.
    My legs are shaking as I ring the bell. Actually shaking. I feel like the scarecrow in The Wizard of Oz . Any minute I’ll collapse on the path and Wanda will torch me for losing the ring.
    Stop, Poppy. It’s fine. No one will suspect anything. My story is, I burned my hand. That’s my story.
    “Hi, Poppy!”
    “Felix! Hi!”
    I’m so relieved it’s Felix at the door, my greeting comes out in a shaky gasp.
    Felix is the baby of the family—only seventeen and still at school. In fact, Magnus has